The Movies and Shows We’re Really Looking Forward to in 2015




Underwire






Avengers: Age of Ultron

Two years after helming the super-team flick that launched the Marvel Cinematic Universe into utter box office (and fanboy heart) dominance, Joss Whedon is bringing together Iron Man, Thor, et al for yet another epic battle. (Expand the gallery for the full write-throughs.)

Marvel



Avengers: Age of Ultron

Why We Can't Wait For It: We could just leave this entry at "Avengers movie" and "directed by Joss Whedon" but where's the fun in that? Two years after helming the super-team flick that launched the Marvel Cinematic Universe into utter box office (and fanboy heart) dominance, Whedon is bringing together Iron Man, Thor, et al for yet another epic battle. This time they're facing off against genocidal robot/thingamabob Ultron (guys, he's frigging James Spader), so we have no doubt this sequel will be just as wicked cool as the last Avengers installment. Even if it does have less Loki. —Angela Watercutter


Marvel



Mad Max: Fury Road

Better movies will surely come out in 2015, movies that will win Oscars and be officially selected at festivals the world over. But none of them will get you as jacked as Mad Max: Fury Road. This is what IMAX-sized movie theaters and Dolby Atmos were invented for. Warner Bros.



Mad Max: Fury Road

Why We Can't Wait For It:

The principals involved in bringing


Mad Max

back to life were enough to make us optimistic: Charlize Theron, Tom Hardy and George Miller himself all assembling to re-up the series with a 21st century sheen. When the


first trailer

debuted at Comic Con, we promptly flipped our lids. It was a sizzle reel that burned hot with “fire and blood," and it hooked us hard. But then the


theatrical trailer

dropped at the beginning of December and we were baptized by its frenetic chaos, ready to follow our prophet Max into the most gnarly of sand storms with every gun ever made blazing. Better movies will surely come out in 2015, movies that will win Oscars and be officially selected at festivals the world over. But


none

of them will get you as jacked as


Mad Max: Fury Road

. Catch that next Noah Baumbach feature on VOD. This is what IMAX-sized movie theaters and Dolby Atmos were invented for.


—Jordan Crucchiola

Warner Bros.



The Rise of Sansa Stark

After 38 tormented episodes of Game of Thrones, Sansa finally looks ready to play the game, and we suspect she’ll be the most proficient contender yet from the Stark bloodline. Nobody is putting this ginger back in the corner. Helen Sloan/Courtesy of HBO



The Rise of Sansa Stark

Why We Can't Wait For It:

The


last time

we saw Sansa Stark it was in the eighth episode of


Game of Thrones

’ most recent season. She was dressed like sex and descending a stone staircase, looking every bit like we’d imagine a young and fair Catelyn Tully back in the day when Lord Baelish’s obsession first took hold. She may have sashayed right past Littlefinger on her way down, but she landed dead center in the middle of his fantasies. After 38 tormented episodes, Sansa finally looks ready to play the game, and we suspect she’ll be the most proficient contender yet from the Stark bloodline (sorry, haughty Arya, naive Rob and idealistic Ned). With Joffrey in the ground and only herself to rely on, nobody is putting this ginger back in the corner.


—Jordan Crucchiola

Helen Sloan/Courtesy of HBO



Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Look, there are all sorts of ways this movie could suck. But we're optimists. Screengrab/YouTube



Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Why We Can't Wait For It:

As I write this, there are 360 days until


Episode VII

hits theaters. And yes, I’m counting. Look, we can all agree there are all sorts of ways this movie could suck. But I’m an optimist. And here’s what I see: J.J. Abrams co-wrote the script with Lawrence Kasdan, who also wrote


The Empire Strikes Back

and


Return of the Jedi

. (OK, so they based the screenplay on an original script by Michael Arndt, but, among other things, he wrote


Toy Story 3

!) The movie takes place 30 years after


Return of the Jedi

, and Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford, Mark Hamill, and the original Chewbacca, C-3PO, and R2-D2 are back. (Plus a zippy, dope-looking rolling droid.) From what I can tell from the


trailer

, one of the new leads is played by John Boyega, who I absolutely loved as Moses in


Attack the Block

. Andy Serkis is in it. So is Gwendoline Christie (Brienne of Tarth from


GoT

) and Lupita Nyong’o for heaven’s sake. I mean, it has to be good, right? “Adventure. Excitement. A Jedi craves not these things,” says Yoda. But I do. I really do. Just a little less than 12 months to go. —


Caitlin Roper

Screengrab/YouTube



Ant-Man

Despite some personnel shake-ups, Marvel hasn't let us down yet, so consider us still stoked for Paul Rudd in this comedy-heist take on the troubled superhero. Marvel



Ant-Man

Why We Can't Wait For It: Actually, we're filing this one under "cautiously optimistic." Originally, when this was shaping up to be a project starring Paul Rudd and directed by Edgar Wright, we were beyond stoked. But Wright dropped out of the movie in May and was eventually replaced by Bring It On director Peyton Reed, who is great but doesn't have much proven superhero movie mettle. Rudd's still around as Scott Lang/Ant-Man and Evangeline Lily has joined the cast as Hank Pym's (Michael Douglas) daughter Hope Van Dyne, so we're holding out, um, hope for Ant-Man, though. Also, Marvel really hasn't let us down yet, so leadership shake-ups aside, we still believe this Ant-Man is redeemable. —Angela Watercutter


Marvel



San Andreas

We may love a good superhero movie, but our true action-flick catnip is anything from the Roland Emmerich School of Unmitigated Disaster. And a Los Angeles-decimating superquake certainly qualifies. New Line Pictures



San Andreas

Why We Can't Wait For It: Because I may love a good superhero movie, but my true action-flick catnip is anything from the Roland Emmerich School of Unmitigated Disaster. Global warming-induced storms? Check. Alien invasion? You know it. A supervolcano threatening a major city? God, yes. And these movies are at their best not when it’s an everyman trying to save his family (like John Cusack in 2012), but when it’s a superswoll everyman trying to save his family. And who’s superswoller than Dwayne “The Rock” “No, Hercules” “No, Not Hercules From The Nutty Professor, the REAL Hercules“ Johnson? Add in Carla Gugino and a few trillion dollars’ worth of digitally simulated death and destruction, and I’m sold...even if the movie turns out to be a very unsimulated disaster. —Peter Rubin


New Line Pictures



The Mad Men Finale

After seven years, Don Draper's mystery has slowly been stripped away, revealing a human being who’s slowly getting closer to the sort of honesty he once kept hidden beneath pseudonyms and suits. Will we still love him just as much without the lies? Frank Ockenfels 3/AMC



The Mad Men Finale

Why We Can't Wait For It: The end is nigh for Don Draper, after seven years of womanizing, virtuoso ad pitches, booze and lies. Don has always been something of a myth; not only does he represent an idealized vision of the classic (white) American man, but how disingenuous that image often is. Part of Don’s appeal, to women, clients and us, was always his mystery, but after seven years it’s slowly been stripped away, revealing a human being who’s slowly getting closer to the sort of honesty he once kept hidden beneath pseudonyms and suits. Only one question remains, the one that always sat at the heart of Don’s deepest fear: Will we still love him just as much without the lies? —Laura Hudson


Frank Ockenfels 3/AMC



The Return of Broad City and Inside Amy Schumer

There’s no dressing it up: We just flat-out love Amy Schumer, Ilana Glazer and Abbi Jacobson. That’s it. And their respective shows produced television highlights every time they came on the air in 2014. Comedy Central/Ali Goldstein



The Return of Broad City and Inside Amy Schumer

Why We Can't Wait For It:

There’s no dressing it up: We just flat-out love Amy Schumer, Ilana Glazer and Abbi Jacobson. That’s it. And their respective shows produced television highlights every time they came on the air in 2014. If you support sisters doing it for themselves,


Inside

and


Broad City

have the added bonuses of being phenomenally out-in-front feminist bullhorns. But these three aren’t just Funny Women; they’re funny people who happen to be women. The late Christopher Hitchens once argued in


Vanity Fair

that women, as a whole, are not funny (a point which he even


defended

later on). Hitchens said that, in part, it’s because they evolutionarily don’t need to be, and that may have been where he missed his target by the widest margin. Women


do

need to be funny. In many cases it’s how they make the experience of being a woman publicly acceptable in a society, and in a medium that’s still largely shaped and defined by men. Schumer, Glazer and Jacobson are writing their own narratives—and being damn hilarious while they’re at it. Besides, if Hitchens had seen the


Broad City

season 3


trailer

, he might have finally changed his mind.


—Jordan Crucchiola

Comedy Central/Ali Goldstein



The Hateful Eight

Any year with a Tarantino feature on the horizon is one to be eagerly anticipated. He doesn’t make them very often, which is why they’re precious, and every production with his name across the could serve as both a seminar in filmmaking and a pop culture artifact. The Weinstein Company



The Hateful Eight

Why We Can't Wait For It: Because we can’t wait for anything labeled "The next project from Quentin Tarantino…" When the script initially leaked for The Hateful Eight—the director’s 10th feature film—Tarantino scrapped his plans for it and the sound of our hearts breaking could be heard across the land. But then, a movie miracle! Tarantino shook off the invasion and decided to resurrect his post-Civil War heist Western. Any year with a Tarantino feature on the horizon is one to be eagerly anticipated. He doesn’t make them very often, which is why they’re precious, and every production with his name across the top, from Reservoir Dogs up through Django Unchained, could serve as both a seminar in filmmaking and a pop culture artifact. It will surely be loud, long, incendiary, beautifully shot (on 70 mm film!) and scored to perfection, because that’s just how Quentin rolls. —Jordan Crucchiola


The Weinstein Company



The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt

NBC's latest comedy gaffe—letting go of Tina Fey's newest project, about a young woman who leaves a cult to move to NYC—is Netflix's huge gain. Netflix



The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt

Why We Can’t Wait For It:

Hi, we’re NBC. Last fall, we


pointed out

that we have no idea what we’re doing when it comes to comedy development. At the time, that meant airing mealy meet-cute pablum while pushing


The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt

back to midseason. And why shouldn’t we have? It was only created by Tina Fey and her


30 Rock

partner Robert Carlock, and stars


The Office

’s Ellie Kemper as a woman who who escapes a cult and moves to New York City. Wait, though, it gets better: instead of airing it in the spring and letting it develop into a worthy successor to


30 Rock

and


Parks & Recreation

’s smart-sitcom legacy, we sold it away to Netflix, who offered a two-year commitment! NBC: mistaking its ass for a hole in the schedule since...well, since whenever it was that


Friends

went off the year. If you need us, we’ll be groveling in front of David Schwimmer’s apartment. —


Peter Rubin

Netflix



Inside Out

Pixar's upcoming story about a young woman's innermost feelings isn't a sequel and has no superheroes—it’s just a bold, clever, original story. We're getting emotional just thinking about it. Pixar



Inside Out

Why We Can't Wait For It: One of the best things about animation is that it can depict worlds we couldn’t see any other way. Pixar director Pete Docter (Monsters, Inc. , Up) is taking this concept to another level in his next film, Inside Out, in theaters June 19. It’s the story of a young girl, Riley Anderson, but the real stars are her emotions—Fear, Anger, Disgust, Sadness, and Joy. These emotions live in Headquarters inside Riley’s mind, helping her navigate a bunch of massive life changes, including a new city (San Francisco), a new house, and a new school. The casting is impeccable: Disgust is voiced by Mindy Kaling, Joy is Amy Poehler, Bill Hader is Fear, Lewis Black is Anger, and Phyllis Smith (of The Office), is Sadness. Inside Out is no sequel, it’s got no superheroes, it’s just a bold, clever, original story. I’m getting emotional just thinking about it. —Caitlin Roper


Pixar



Togetherness

By now, mumblecore’s self-absorbed twentysomethings are circling in on 40, with marriage and parenting ennui that eclipses the post-college doldrums, and Togetherness looks to plumb those depths for HBO susbcribers, with the Duplass Brothers' signature candor. HBO/Jaimie Trueblood



Togetherness

Why We Can't Wait For It: In truth we don’t have long to wait at all—Mark and Jay Duplass’ newest project hits HBO on Jan. 11—but on pedigree alone this one’s a winner. While the Duplass brothers got their start in the “mumblecore” movement (The Puffy Chair), they moved on to writing and directing slightly bigger movies that still had a complex emotional core (Jeff, Who Lives at Home and Cyrus were among my favorite movies in 2010 and 2011, respectively). By now, they’re both far more recognizable—Mark for acting in The League, as well as indie darlings like Safety Not Guaranteed and The One I Love, and Jay for his role in Amazon’s Transparent—but that doesn’t mean they can’t get back to their writing/directing roots. By now, mumblecore’s self-absorbed twentysomethings are circling in on 40, with marriage and parenting ennui that eclipses the post-college doldrums, and Togetherness looks to plumb those depths with the Duplass’ signature candor. If you have any room in your heart for ensemble dramedies about angsty white people, then make an equal amount of room on your DVR. —Peter Rubin


HBO/Jaimie Trueblood



Jupiter Ascending

The Wachowskis may strike out a lot, but it’s because they swing for the fences every single time. No one goes bigger and harder and crazier with an original idea than these two, and that’s a trademark we can respect. Considering it’s been 16 years since they had a bona fide hit, the law of averages says this duo is on schedule for a grand slam. Warner Bros.



Jupiter Ascending

Why We Can't Wait For It:

Because thanks to watching 10 years of


The X-Files

, we will never stop wanting to believe. We won’t kid you. The Wachowski siblings haven’t actually dazzled us since the first


Matrix

back in 1999. The rest of that trilogy was either too samey or too nonsensical, and while


V for Vendetta

was fun, Andy and Lana’s final products pretty much never match up to the scope of their ambitions. But those ambitions are grander than almost anyone else making movies today, and therein lies the source of our undying hope! The Wachowskis may strike out a lot, but it’s because they swing for the fences every single time. No one goes bigger and harder and crazier with an original idea than these two, and that’s a trademark we can respect. Considering it’s been 16 years since they had a bona fide hit, the law of averages says this duo is on schedule for a grand slam. And have you seen this


trailer

?! It looks positively magnificent! Channing Tatum, Mila Kunis, Eddie Redmayne, Sean Bean: Work your magic!


—Jordan Crucchiola

Warner Bros.



Pitch Perfect 2

The Barden Bellas are back and Hailee Steinfeld has joined the cast and Elizabeth Banks is directing and for some reason David Cross is here hosting a cappella riff-offs, and … oh, who are we kidding? We'd see this movie even if it was just Anna Kendrick making fart noises. Universal Studios



Pitch Perfect 2

Why We Can't Wait For It: The first Pitch Perfect was a little left-field indie musical comedy that—thanks to the internet's love of catchphrases and videos about cups—became a massive sensation. (It also reminded everyone that under no circumstances should Anna Kendrick not be permitted to sing in a film. In fact, it should be mandatory.) Now, the Barden Bellas are back and Hailee Steinfeld has joined the cast and Elizabeth Banks is directing and for some reason David Cross is here hosting a cappella riff-offs, and … oh, who are we kidding? We'd see this movie even if it was just Kendrick making fart noises. No diggity. —Angela Watercutter


Universal Studios



The Last Five Years

Musicals aren’t for everyone. But if you’ve ever experienced a relationship crumbling before your very eyes against the drunk-in-love background of New York City, then this adaptation is for you.



The Last Five Years

Why We Can't Wait For It: Look, we get it: Musicals aren’t for everyone. But if you’ve ever experienced a seemingly magical relationship crumbling before your very eyes (doubly so if that happened against the drunk-in-love background of New York City), this 2015 adaptation of composer Jason Robert Brown’s two-person sung-through show, about the five-year arc of a relationship between Jamie (Jeremy Jordan), a Jewish rising-star novelist, and Cathy (Anna Kendrick), a shiksa and struggling actor, will probably force tears to spew horizontally from your eyeballs, not just for your own lost love, but for the heartbreaking way in which their story is told: Cathy begins her telling from the end, and Jamie from the beginning. Also, the music is approximately one thousand times better than Pitch Perfect’s (sorry, Angela). Try to sob quietly through this one, but we’ll understand if you can’t. —Devon Maloney








At the end of every year, we look back, and that’s fine. It’s a great way to relive your favorites, find out about things you might have missed, and tour the zeitgeist. But it’s always more entertaining to think about all the fantastic stuff coming down the pike. Anticipation trumps memory, after all, and speculation is a key component of that excitement. Whether it’s a new movie or a returning show, a premiere or a finale, action blockbuster or indie musical (yes, seriously—we’re omnivores, people), we’re jazzed for all the fantastic pop culture that 2015 has in store for us. Join us for a look at your *minor chord* entertainment future. (Hmm, that was supposed to sound a bit more ominous. Sorry.)





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